July 18.
We take the ferry to Vigo… See you in 10 days, Dione IV!
A 15 minutes crossing to the south side of the Ria. Tom & Marcia from the boat Bird Song coincidentally travel at the same time to the US for a funeral. In Vigo, the 4 of us have lunch and then we take the Flix bus to Porto Airport.
We check in the airport hotel and take a Bolt (like Uber) into Porto. First thing to do is Port tasting at Dos Corvos! We taste some delicious Port wines but our favorite stays the same: the 20-year old white Port.
We take a walk around the city. Here, a procession is being prepared in a church.
The iconic view at the bridge over the Douro river.
And of course, a visit to Castro for the best Pastel de Nata anywhere! 😋
July 19.
A long day of travel today… The flight Porto-Newark-Phoenix and then drive to Prescott where we have an Airbnb booked near Sher’s mom.
July 20.
Sher’s cousins are also visiting MomCat, so we enjoy some time together.
July 23.
We take a trip to the Grand Canyon. A two-hour drive from Prescott through the endless desert.
The views are stunning! Such an impressive landscape!
We are very lucky. The view is even more clear than they show on a clear day!
Wild fires could fully block the view. There are fires at the northern side of the canyon. On this picture, these are not clouds, it’s smoke from the fires! But today the wind blows this smoke away from us.
The squirrels are very funny!
Sher brought some nuts (for us to eat) but they are crazy about ‘m!
July 25.
We fly back from Prescott to Newark. Sher’s best friend Michele picks us up from the airport and we drive to her home in Wayne.
We have a great time with her and her partner Nigel. They celebrate their engagement party with an elegant BBQ dinner.
We have been ordering a lot of stuff for the boat in the US. Many things are easier to get and cheaper there. One of the things we ordered is an electric outboard motor for the dinghy. Our 10HP Tohatsu engine is nice and we’ll certainly keep it but it’s heavy. It’s a pain to hoist it down and up from the dinghy (we use our mizzen boom and mizzen halyard as a lift for that), it’s heavy to hoist the dinghy alongside (we do that at night so it won’t be stolen and to prevent growth on the bottom of the dinghy) and it’s heavy to pull it on its wheels over a soft sandy beach. The electric motor is only 12kg’s. Against the 38kg’s of the Tohatsu.
This Newport brand motor is one of the few with an external battery. We didn’t want one with an internal battery (like Torqueedo or E-Propulsion) because they’re heavy (mainly because of the battery). And we have our scooter battery packs to power it!
July 26.
The Newport motor is made in California and not available in Spain. So, we had it send to Michele and we take it in a big duffel bag with us.
But…it was to big for the duffel… So, we had to dissemble it and divide the parts over our 2 duffels.
We had to buy some tools to take everything apart and even modify an Allen key 😅
Luckily, Sher ordered 7m of mesh material from Sailrite to make the window sun shades and this is perfect for padding the electric motor in the duffel.
We rap all parts carefully. Not to get damaged when the duffels are being throw around at the airports.
There is also some fabric Michele gave Sher and a few other misc things to bring back… two big over-stuffed duffels on wheels to take back.
July 29.
We had a great visit in Arizona and in New Jersey, but now it’s time to get back home to the boat and continue our wonderful time in the Spanish Ria’s!
Here, we fly over New York. 6 hours later we land at Porto airport.
A 2-hour bus ride to Vigo and here we are on the ferry back to Moaña.
Everything is good on board of Dione IV. Of course, we’ve kept an eye on her via the cameras in the masts, our new camera in the decksalon, and the Victron remote management system but it’s nice to see it with our own eyes 😊
It seemed like we were away for a long time, but it was actually less than two weeks. We’re glad to be home! Tomorrow we head out of the marina and happy to be anchoring again.
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